Tag Archives: Hard Drive

Sometimes while we are browsing the internet whether it be watching YouTube or perhaps doing research for a school project. At some point, you will come across Scare Ware.

An example of scareware you might see.

Simply put, Scare Ware is an attempt to gain your trust and cause anxiety and make you believe your computer is infected. It will say something like: “Warning your PC is infected! Hard drive is crashing in 10 seconds and will be deleted! call this number!” or something else to cause fear. Don’t panic, don’t click on the prompt or anywhere on the page and don’t call that number. Your computer is perfectly fine.

They want you to call the number and if you click on the prompt it will begin to download a virus or a trojan of some kind and infect your computer. What the guys on the phone will do is run a fake scan on your computer and tell you your computer is “infected” which if you clicked on the prompt it will be at that point but if not you will be fine.

They will “clean” your PC and then charge you a handsome fee for security protection known as “vaporware” which means it’s a fake program that actually does nothing on your PC.

So how do you prevent this mess from happening? When one of this things pops up and hijacks your browsing session, simply close out of your browser completely and when you start it back up, clear your cache in your browser and move on. There is nothing to fear because your PC is not infected if you didn’t click on the “free download” button if there was one or something like it.

Today, I thought I would go through the different parts of you computer that make it run and give a little information of how it runs.

CPU - Central Processing Unit

Let’s start with the powerhouse of the computer, the CPU, Central processing unit. The CPU is the main element in executing programs. It’s the boss, and it tells everyone what to do. They are about the size of a post it and a quarter inch thick. On top of them usually sits a fan to cool the CPU because the CPU generates large amounts of heat, it’s tough bossing around an entire computer system.

Motherboard

The CPU sits on the Motherboard, which is what connects everything together. They come in various sizes to fit different cases and laptops. This is where all of your usb devices plug into.

Memory also known as RAM isn’t quite what one would think given its name, it’s easiest to think of it as your short term memory, it stores the information you want to use right now. This leaves the CPU free so it can run faster, instead of always having to get information off of your hard drive (which is a lot slower than the memory and has further to travel to get to your CPU.) This plugs into the motherboard and is usually seated close to the CPU.

Another device that is connected to the motherboard is the Video Card, which creates the images that you see on your monitor and is where you plug into your monitor. Sometimes these come as part of the motherboard.

Video Card

Finally there is the power supply and Hard Drive. The power supply is the unit that provides power to all the devices running in your computer, this is the real power. (Cue Tim Allen laugh)

Then there is the Hard Drive, this is your long term memory, it is where everything is stored; iTunes, your favorite video, even that homework you worked on last semester and will never look at again. A hard drives come in two main sizes, the first is about the size of a small empty wallet, like most of us have in college, and the other is the size of small book.